


The Monster with Red Hair

by Lo_DuClavier (lo_sequence)



Category: Fringe
Genre: F/M, Monster Works
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-24
Updated: 2009-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-05 05:12:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/38157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lo_sequence/pseuds/Lo_DuClavier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Title: The Monster with Red Hair<br/>Rating: M<br/>Summary: Nina the monster wakes to another Oversummer; angst fic<br/>Characters: Nina Sharp, Phillip Broyles<br/>Fandom: Fringe<br/>Spoilers: Anything Season One and Two<br/>Disclaimer: Not mine, etc.<br/>Notes: For the sweetest Scio ;)<br/>Prompt: "Monster Works", Nina & Phillip<br/>Warnings: None!</p>
    </blockquote>





	The Monster with Red Hair

**Author's Note:**

> Title: The Monster with Red Hair  
> Rating: M  
> Summary: Nina the monster wakes to another Oversummer; angst fic  
> Characters: Nina Sharp, Phillip Broyles  
> Fandom: Fringe  
> Spoilers: Anything Season One and Two  
> Disclaimer: Not mine, etc.  
> Notes: For the sweetest Scio ;)  
> Prompt: "Monster Works", Nina &amp; Phillip  
> Warnings: None!

It's 6:45 in the morning when Nina Sharp begins to stir from the slumber of Summer, the cool grey of Oversummer waking her up in the comfortable nest in the rafters of her colonial style house’s attic. Her eyes are still heavy and her mind is somewhat hazy as she shifts slightly beneath the comfortable blankets covering her. Something small, soft, and warm is wrapped in her arms, nestled against her breasts and she begins to purr, her body curling around it closer. However, as she starts to become more lucid, she realises that what she's cradling is in fact a pillow and not a pup. Her purring fades and she peeks her eyes open to the dim light of the attic.

How many Oversummers has she woken with pangs of maternal desire? Too many and this is just another tally mark to add to the list. Countless times she finds herself wishing to enter Summer gravid and wake up in Oversummer with a pup she’d given birth to as she Slept. She longs to be a mother more than anything in the world and knows that’s the one thing her wealth and success can’t bring her. While Nina has always been very lucky, she just knows that the one in five odds of her offspring being female are just too high a gamble to take. Of course a male would easily bring her twelve, possibly thirteen years of absolute bliss; then would come a day when she felt the urge to devour the flesh that was made of her own and that simply wasn’t acceptable—wanting something for so long only to consume it.

Sometimes she’s considered taking a human pup as her own, but then the reality of the matter sobers her. The species difference wouldn’t be so hard to conquer—after all, many humans have learned to love canines and felines as part of their own familial units, so as long at the human pup understood the importance of secrets, she wouldn’t have to worry about her wings, fangs, tail, or horns. But she couldn’t possibly hire a nanny to care for the human pup while she Slept—there are laws against it and the Summer the human pup that would be without her hardly seemed to be fair.

Nina sighs and the expansion of her lungs wakes Phillip Broyles, who is comfortably wrapped around her.

“Hello,” he whispers, his warm breath moving across the back of her neck.

Despite her heartbreak, she starts purring again and cuddles back into his warm hold. Being one of the only three females in a two hundred mile radius Nina has the pick of any male she wants. Phillip is handsome, young, and keeps her grounded. He’s been her den mate for quite a number of years now and unfortunately it seems that in their struggle to fit in with humans they have actually fallen love, both under the desperate hope that they would be different, that they might be able to rise above their instincts and live together in the image of the American dream: a house with a white picket fence, a happy husband and wife, two lovely children. She has the 1.2 million dollar home on the edge of town, she has the loving mate, but pups are simply not an option. After all, if Nina has a male pup, it will be much harder for Phillip to kill her…

“Sleep well?” she asks, letting her tail intertwine with his.

“Very,” he rumbles. “And you?”

“Wonderful.”

He nuzzles against her neck. “We built a good nest this year. My back isn’t sore like last year.”

“I told you it would be worth it to order materials,” she says smugly as she licks the back of her hand and uses it to start cleaning her face.

“And you were entirely right. Next spring it will be nice to avoid collecting willows and thatching for Summer.”

In the distance, she can smell the faintest hint of moisture. “The Wet Seasons are coming sooner. I can smell the clouds already.”

“By the end of the month,” he agrees, dragging his scratchy tongue along her nape, causing her purring to become louder.

In return, she lifts one of his hands to her mouth and begins to lick him clean, the only sound being their happy purring. Phillip's gentle grooming is soothing to her and she yawns loudly, stretching out her own tongue the way cats do.

“We should probably get up and have something to eat,” she observes as she listens to her mate’s stomach growl.

“There is a roast in the freezer that is calling my name,” he says as he climbs out from under the blankets.

“I’m craving venison,” she decides, her mouth watering at the thought of the buck she and Phillip had taken down last year.

There is a swooping staircase leading from their position in the rafters to the floor below and like the gentleman he is, Phillip offers her a hand as they descend the steps. Three Oversummers ago she’d sleepily misjudged the distance between the nest and the landing and had crippled her right wing beyond use. It still doesn’t fit perfectly against her back.

Phillip shakes out the dove grey satin dressing gown she left hanging on a peg and she wraps it around her, happy to be covered from the slight draft up here in the bare attic. He slips into black pyjamas he left for himself and they share a tender kiss before they open the door leading to the rest of the house.

In the large pantry downstairs, Nina digs through a freezer to find both the venison she wanted and the roast for Phillip while he goes outside to patrol the grounds. She defrosts the meat in the microwave of her large, beautiful kitchen, basking for a few minutes in the light of the sun that cloaks the room in yellow. She stretches out her arms and transfers the now lukewarm meat to a preheating oven.

She yawns again and drags her tongue over her sharp canines, but pauses when she feels her tail fluff out. She gives an irritated sigh—she’s hardly been awake an hour and already she’s in heat?

“Already?” she hisses, trying to keep her wings tucked against her back.

As if on cue, Phillip comes into the kitchen, his wings spread out and the tuft on his own tail bristled—somewhere from the point of being outside to reaching her in the kitchen he’s shed his shirt so she can see his muscles. He struts past her a few times, looking large and admittedly impressive as he stretches his wings out to display how massive a wingspan he possesses. He grunts loudly as he works on rubbing the flocking off his horns by using the doorjamb leading into the dinning room; she narrows her eyes, trying to ignore him as she pokes at the oven’s buttons—sometimes she forgets how fast pheromones travel through the air.

Obviously seeing that she isn’t going to give in to him immediately, he comes up behind her, purring loudly. His hands snake around her to unknot her dressing gown’s sash and she rolls her eyes as the satin pools on the floor around her feet.

His fingers begin to preen her feathers and he leans his mouth next to her ear. “Have I told you how beautiful you look in the morning?”

“Begone, Phillip,” she growls, spinning around, trying to catch him with her left horn. “I’m not in the mood for ritual gestures that do not assuage my biological need of parturition.”

He envelops them in his wings, drawing her closer to him and she feels how hot his skin is. “We might have a female.”

“We might,” she says halfheartedly.

He pulls back from her and crosses his arms across his chest. “You confuse me sometimes. Wanting two completely opposite things.”

“I’m a Gemini, Phillip. I’ll always want two completely opposite things,” she says coolly, trying to keep her emotions under wraps.

“Wanting pups, but denying yourself them,” he scolds. “We aren’t animals. You and I could happily raise a healthy brood together. Why, I’ll happily go build a brooder for you in that room with the large windows over looking the plain.”

Nina averts her eyes from him, pretending to be interested in the oven once more. She’d specifically bought the house thirty years ago because she thought that room would make a perfect place to use for a pup.

“Humans call it a nursery,” she says softly.

Again he nuzzles at her neck, his voice desperate. “A nursery. I’ll build you one.”

“Oh Phillip,” she sighs, feeling his anguish as her own.

They stand silently, both heartbroken at the thought that aside from a miracle, they will never have pups of their own.

She gives him a gentle peck on the cheek. “Let’s set to work taking down the nest, hmmm?”

His sad smile tears her heart in two and together they head back upstairs to dismantle this year’s Summer nest as their food cooks in the oven.

**  
**

**Author's Note:**

> This is based off FaustAutumn's "Monster Works" http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5423033/1/Monster_Works


End file.
